The best Super Mario games ever – the top 14 games from Bros. To Galaxy

With Super Mario 3D World out today GameCentral attempts to rank all 14 key Super Mario titles and in the process name the best game ever made…

You may already have heard but the PlayStation 4 is released today in the UK. But it’s not the only important launch this week and although we’ve already reviewed Super Mario 3D World its release today deserves not to be forgotten. It is, after all, the best game released this month, arguably of this year, and certainly superior to any of the exclusives on the Xbox One and PlayStation 4.

But where does it stand in comparison to other Super Mario games? So many of which have at one time or another been regarded as the best game ever made. That’s not been an easy question to answer but in the style of our recent top 16 of Zelda games we’ve tried to put the most significant Mario games into some kind of order or merit.

The Super Mario series is more loosely defined than Zelda and while obviously things like Mario Kart and Paper Mario don’t count for the sake of both brevity and the fact that technically they’re separate subs-series we’ve left out the Wario Land and New Super Mario games. (The latter also because they’re mostly not as good as the regular games, although the best of them – New Super Mario Bros. U – would probably sneak in at somewhere around number 11 and 12 in our list.)

It’s all subjective of course and as with the Zelda list there are no bad games here, in fact most of the top 10 are stone cold classics. Almost all of the Super Mario games have been re-released multiple times, although as with Zelda only a few are available via the Wii U eShop itself, but if you visit the separate Wii Virtual Console you’ll find a few more there.

Many of the re-releases feature slightly tweaked gameplay and/or graphics, particularly those derived from the SNES remake compilation Super Mario All-Stars. We’ve indicated those versions that are markedly different by including the re-release’s name in brackets.

As any Nintendo aficionado will know this is the real sequel to the original Super Mario Bros. It was created as soon as the first game became a hit and shows a fascinatingly naïve approach to creating sequels – in that it’s really just the first game but a lot harder. The levels have been rearranged to make them more difficult, in the process ruining the flow and pace of each stage – turning the harsh but fair difficulty of the original into a frustrating slog. And yet it did introduce a few minor new elements to the series, as it was the first to feature poison mushrooms and to have Luigi jump higher but be more difficult to control than Mario.

13. Super Mario Sunshine (2002)
GameCube

The frustrating thing about Sunshine is that the first half of the game is excellent and warming up to become a worthy follow-up to Super Mario 64. But, very much like Zelda: The Wind Waker, it suffered from a rushed development schedule and the second half of the game devolves into considerably less imaginative set pieces and obvious padding. It’s a shame, as the use of the FLUDD jetpack to give you a second chance if you fall works well but the game is encumbered by a terrible 3D camera and a general lack of polish. The void levels though, without the safety net of FLUDD, are a revelation and although fantastically hard remain amongst the series’ most interesting experiments in fully 3D gameplay.

Quickly realising that The Lost Levels was not a worthy sequel to the original this is what was actually released in the West as Super Mario Bros. 2 (and is known in Japan as Super Mario USA). Contrary to popular belief it did start out as a Mario game, before being changed into an unrelated franchise, and then changed back again. Nevertheless it’s very different to any other Mario title before or since: a flip scrolling adventure style game with a much slower pace and a greater emphasis on exploration rather than straight action. Most crucially you can’t kill enemies by jumping on them but have to pick up objects (primarily vegetables) and throw them instead. As with every Mario game it has had its lasting influences, with the four playable characters and their different abilities a key part of this year’s Super Mario 3D World.

11. Super Mario Land (1989)
Game Boy; also on 3DS Virtual Console

Both a more direct follow-up to Super Mario Bros. and a better game than either of the two actual sequels, the Game Boy games were overseen by Metroid producer Gunpei Yokoi rather than Miyamoto. The result is a subtly different flavour of 2D gameplay, with more enemies that are resistant to being jumped on and unique power-ups such as the Superball Flower that shoots out bouncing balls that can also be used to collect coins. There are also unusual vehicle-based levels in a plane and submarine that are more 2D shooter than platformer.

10. Super Mario 3D Land (2011)
3DS

Despite the name this has nothing really to do with the old Game Boy series and was instead an attempt to create a variant of the Super Mario Galaxy style gameplay for a smaller portable screen. Realising that exactly the same style wouldn’t work on the move, Nintendo created a new hybrid style for the series that is halfway between the 2D gameplay of the earlier titles and the full 3D movement of the newer ones. It works very well too but the game is slightly let down by too much repetition in some of the levels and set pieces, and a lack of challenge until you get well into the post-game unlocks. Both of which issues have been addressed in the Wii U follow-up.

Still the best portable Mario game, and one of the best Game Boy games of any kind, 6 Golden Coins is more of a spiritual successor to Super Mario World than it is the 8-bit games. That means a non-linear world map, levels that you can back track on if you want, a spin jump move, and an equivalent of the Super Leaf power-up (although here it’s a bunny suit). The level design is almost equally as good as its inspiration and although lauded at the time it’s a shame that the game is increasingly forgotten nowadays. This was also the first Mario game to introduce anti-hero Wario, with subsequent sequels making him the protagonist and morphing into the Wario Land spin-off series.

8. Super Mario 3D World (2013)
Wii U

Putting any of these games into an order of merit is difficult enough but it’s especially hard for a brand new game, whose place in the pantheon of Super Mario titles can only really be decided with the benefit of hindsight. But even now it’s obvious that 3D World is a more than worthy entry in the series. As with 3D Land it bridges the gap between 2D and 3D gameplay, while this time throwing in the four-player action of the New Super Mario series. But what really elevates 3D World above its predecessor is the imagination that’s gone into the stage design and the huge array of power-ups – not to mention the stunning visuals.

Some will argue that Yoshi’s Island isn’t technically a Super Mario game, with the connection to World certainly only added in at the last minute for marketing reasons. Not that the game’s anything less than amazing but you control Yoshi the dinosaur, not Mario – who’s infant form is instead carted around on your back. It’s still a 2D platformer though, with the slower and more deliberate pacing allowing for more puzzle-like set pieces and some particularly memorable bosses. The visuals too are superb, with the seemingly hand drawn graphics still looking as impressive today as they ever did.

The original and to many people’s still the best, it is extraordinary that a game created over 25 years ago is still as playable and influential today as it ever was. Even the best games see their lustre dull over time, but the only thing that really dates Super Mario Bros. in gameplay terms is the increasingly spiteful difficult level. In terms of controls and level design the game still has everything to teach modern titles. But it’s not just the unbridled joy of controlling Mario himself but the subtle nuance in his abilities, as he kicks koopa shells and discovers hidden secrets – elements that would underpin all the subsequent games in the years to come.

Probably the most accomplished 8-bit video game ever made, and another Mario title whose magic hasn’t faded one iota in all these decades. As a 2D platformer it’s surpassed only by its successor Super Mario World and features many of the same concepts, with larger multi-directional levels, the introduction of flight to Mario’s repartee, and an expansion of the concept of power-ups so that items like the frog suit and Tanooki suit not only gave you extra offensive abilities but also allow you to explore the game world further. With so many secrets you could play the game a hundred times and not see them all, which is exactly what happened with most people.

Another game from the era when launch titles were still industry-defining events, not hurried stopgaps, Super Mario 64 is arguably the most important game of the modern era and certainly set standards in terms of controls and camera work that many other games were struggling to catch up with a decade later. In terms of its effortless charm and imagination its barely ever been matched, expanding the concept of the Super Mario series into a less structured, more exploration-based experience that refused to be bounded by any genre conventions and whose only goal was to show you something you hadn’t seen before: from flying levels to the genuinely spooky ghost levels.

Now that we’re into the top five games not only are their exact positions all equally interchangeable but all five (the top seven, really) have at some point in their life being widely acknowledged as the best video game ever made. Super Mario World held that title for a long time and for many is the zenith of Nintendo’s 2D platformer prowess. Still similar to Super Mario Bros., it made use of the SNES’s extra horsepower by introducing larger levels and new power-ups that allowed Mario to fly more effectively or, for the first time, to use Yoshi as a mount. Filled to the brim with secrets and always rewarding experimentation, Super Mario World remains a near perfect masterpiece.

2. Super Mario Galaxy (2007)
Wii

With Super Mario Sunshine a flawed effort it was over a decade before Nintendo was able to produce a new 3D game that was a genuinely worthy successor to Super Mario 64. Galaxy pulls back on the exploration elements and simplifies Mario’s moveset, allowing more direct comparisons to the earlier games and an extra focus on unique set pieces. The theme of the game is playing with the concept of gravity and three-dimensional movement, with multiple stages where you’re running around upside or around tiny planetoids, but Galaxy never feels bound to just a few gimmicks. From raging battles around a giant toy robot to the repeated segues into 2D the game is obsessed with ensuring a relentless assault of new ideas.

1. Super Mario Galaxy 2 (2010)
Wii

Although many often lump the Galaxy games together as one that’s a great disservice to two such amazing games, especially given the difficulties in actually creating sequel to such a universally acclaimed title. There are no radical changes here, but just enough embellishments and refinements to help exceed even the near perfection of the original. Yoshi is now a fully playable character and there are new suits too, as well as a substantially harder challenge in the final few special stages. Which gives the game even more opportunity to come up with brilliant new concepts, inventing and discarding ideas in just two or three stages that would have sustained lesser games for a whole franchise. This above all is the hallmark of every great Super Mario game and embodied nowhere better than in Super Mario Galaxy 2.